Believe it or not, people were much more civilized back then, even the rioters. If we have riots the size of the 60’s events, they'll be much worse because of the barbarity of today's society. You'll see.

I was born in 1966 so the race riots then are basically flickering images I vaguely remember on our 1959 Philco B&W TV. I think we had riots here in Pittsburgh when Martin Luther King was assassinated. I know another thing, the riots were a huge force in people buying VHF/UHF radios and early police scanners to tune in police calls.

I was a young teen in 1965 and lived about 20 miles from the LA/Watts riots. It was bad and very intense even away from the epicenter, but most of it was contained in and around Watts. I watched all the coverage of the 68 riots and during the Rodney King riots, the unrest was bad in LA, but minor riots spread accross the country.

The Zimmerman verdict has the potential to be very bad. Racial tensions have gotten worse under Obama.

I remember them pretty well although I was not in them. Go look at footage of the LA riots after the Rodney King trial, and multiply those by a small factor, say 2 or 3. Maybe 5. They were kind of terrifying, because there was no imagining the upper limit of how far they might go. There were adjoining blocks in Detroit which were afire all at once, and that’s certainly nothing we are used to seeing. And, remember, TV coverage in 1965 was quite larval compared to what it might be today in terms of coverage. I lived in NJ, and maybe 12 miles outside of Newark, which was quite run down and indeed had some rioting, but nothing at all like Detroit. Detroit never recovered. I am not sure one could say that about any other city where riots occurred. Certainly some cities lost maybe 15 years...not forgetting that 10 years after 1965 was the middle of the 70’s which was quite a crappy era in many ways.

I was born in ‘51 and raised in upstate NY. No race riots there, but I remember them on the TV every single night for what seemed like forever. It felt like they might have occurred on Mars for all the effect it had on us. However, getting sucker-punched in the face in downtown Ithaca and watching the race riots taught me to stay out of inner cities at a young age. I worked in Compton on a short job in ‘74 and was extremely wary.

Chicago’s East Side, a small industrial area and the home of many residents of Yugoslav heritage was probably better known as a hotbed of union activity and a stronghold for the Daley machine than it was for gangsters. Nonetheless “The Night Chicago Died” put the community on the map.

Competing currents in the civil rights movement. On one hand, there was MLK with his non-violent approach. On the other hand, there were assorted militant black elements primarily following orders from Moscow.

One cannot help but notice that since the Soviet Union fell, there have been none of the periodic riots that characterized the 60's, 70's and 80's. One can safely throw in the LA riots into that group since it occurred so soon after the Soviet Union collapsed.

Those riots were mainly 1965-68. Up through 1964, I would say the civil rights movement was pretty much a righteous cause. But starting in 1965, and increasingly thereafter, not so much. The significant gains had been achieved, and things started to go downhill. The more "militant" leaders began to come to the fore. LBJ's Great Society began to destroy the black community. Then in 1968, after the King assassination, there were lots of riots.

(BTW, I date 1965 as the start of the decline of the American culture.)

I grew up in Detroit, though fortunately, my family moved out in ‘65, 2 years before the major riot of 1967. It was an event that would brand Detroit so many bad names, from “Murder Capital” to “Bad Boy” (Detroit Pistons) images. In 1967 it was a war zone with the National Guard out in full force, APCs in the streets, tanks and a curfew.

Block upon block of the inner city burned and firefighters who came to put them out were killed by snipers. The Detroit police responded with an iron fist, shooting a lot of folks who were looting.

Even in the northwestern suburbs where 99% of the Whites fled, there were rumors (unfounded) that Blacks would come out to our areas and kill White people, just to make a point. We were in a sort of “lock down” and we were armed, almost creating a militia, just in case.

This landmark even of 1967 was worse than the previous race riots of 1945. I was not yet born in 1945, so I guess, look it up on Google.

Detroit never recovered, it remained a gutted, grammarian city with many African American (note, previously, I used the term “Black”, you could do that then) Mayors, each one more corrupt than the previous one.

The true downfall happened with the aid of two individuals, Mayor Coleman Young and City councilman, Kenneth Cockrel. These two, more than any other politicians, DESTROYED Detroit.

A few years later, Toyota and Japan, Inc. would polish off the job, began in 1967...

There were tons of activists (Black Panthers, Black Muslims, etc) that were whipping up the fever to get “our” fair share. Hot summers, a social match lit here or there and the riots would take off. And the community activists lighting the matches were most often self serving egoists (sound familiar with our POTUS?)

As some one said above, always in their own neighborhoods which set their cause back yet farther.

One of the more interesting books I read that discusses that era is David Horowitz’s biography “Radical Son: A Generational Odyssey”. Horowitz was raised by American Communists in the 1950’s on Long Island. Like a duck to water, he took to all the social movements of the 60’s - living in Oakland CA, until the hypocrisy woke him up.

31
posted on 07/05/2013 9:52:07 PM PDT
by llevrok
(We are in a new Cold War. At home.)

During the Rodney King riots, I saw a thug being arrested by cops for assaulting and perhaps killing someone in the street. The newsperson shoved a microphone into the perp’s face and he shouted at the top of his lungs,

When the Watts riots broke out, we were in Germany—and they made the headlines there. Outside the hotel where I was staying at the corner of Heidelberger and Moosberg in Darmstadt—halfway around the world from Watts—I heard someone out on the street shout, “burn, baby, burn”!

Anyone remember when Bobby Kennedy was killed? About the same time the feds raided an unlicensed machine gun manufacturing firm in so Cal. It was said LBJ knew of it and the guns were sent to South and Central America.

The first violent race riots occurred on a small scale in 1963-64 in southern and northern cities including New York and Chicago centered around police treatment of black people.

Grievances against the police for real or rumored wrongs could bring a crowd onto the streets leading to small scale disturbances.

Sometimes a peaceful racial protest would get out of hand.

The small riots of 63 and 64 were followed after a lull for the 1964 election campaign by the bigger riots punctuated by Watts (LA) in 1965 and Detroit and Newark, NJ in 1967.

Nationwide rioting followed the assassination of MLK in April 1968 with dozens killed and hundreds of millions in damage involving many cities including Baltimore, Washington DC and Chicago.

After the massive race riots energy moved to anti-war protests and riots for the next few years but racial rioting did spread to smaller cities like mine York, PA where two were killed and dozens injured in racial disturbances in July 1969.

37
posted on 07/05/2013 9:58:24 PM PDT
by Nextrush
(A BALANCED BUDGET NOW AND PRESIDENT SARAH PALIN ARE AT THE TOP OF MY LIST)

My grandfather, uncle and their family (Americans of Japanese descent) ran and lived behind a small market right in the middle of the LA Watts riot in 1965. Even though we lived only 10 miles away there was nothing that could be done to help them.

Fortunately they had a great relationship with his neighborhood and suffered no harm or damage.

Not so good for others in the neighborhood, the main supermarket in the area burned down and they did not rebuild.

I was born in 51 and raised in upstate NY. No race riots there, but I remember them on the TV every single night for what seemed like forever. It felt like they might have occurred on Mars for all the effect it had on us. However, getting sucker-punched in the face in downtown Ithaca and watching the race riots taught me to stay out of inner cities at a young age. I worked in Compton on a short job in 74 and was extremely wary.

I was born in ‘51, too. I was growing up on a ranch during those riots. They had no effect on us, either. We carried guns around in the pick up’s but they were for hunting or rattle snakes.

I learned about race relations in the Army.

45
posted on 07/05/2013 10:02:37 PM PDT
by laplata
(Liberals don't get it. Their minds have been stolen.)

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